


Three and a Half

by Mustang_Girl16



Series: The End of All Things [1]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Implied Sexual Content, Light Angst, Romanogers Week 2019
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-02
Updated: 2019-03-02
Packaged: 2019-11-08 06:16:40
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,473
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17976032
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mustang_Girl16/pseuds/Mustang_Girl16
Summary: For Romanogers Week 2019!Prompt was this I promise you.She had a rule, you never promised anything. It didn’t matter how much you thought you would be able to keep it, because things like promises, they break people.





	Three and a Half

**Author's Note:**

  * For [sleepygrimm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleepygrimm/gifts), [chalantness](https://archiveofourown.org/users/chalantness/gifts), [Swietek93](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Swietek93/gifts), [salacious](https://archiveofourown.org/users/salacious/gifts).



> Hey everyone this is late, but I had it, like over a week ago and it was almost ready then things happened and it didn't get finished. It just goes to show even when I don't procrastinate, life does it for me XD
> 
> Anyways, I should say this takes place technically at the end of Endgame, and it may contain spoilers, but like its all speculation. I have no idea if this will happen. But if you aren't up for reading things about Endgame, before Endgame that's okay! But for those of you who wish to read, grab a tissue and take a seat. (Don't worry I didn't kill anyone, this is rather happy for me).

She had a rule, you never promised anything. It didn’t matter how much you thought you would be able to keep it, because things like promises, they break people. They destroy time and time again, and it’s easier to avoid having to make such a commitment. But right now, as they watched the portal close having killed Thanos, she knew if she didn’t hear the words herself, she wouldn’t be able to let him go. Steve had one last thing to do, he had to go stop Red Skull from getting sucked into the Tesseract and through space, which meant he also had to take off his regulator. Doing so meant he’d inhabit his body back in 1945.

There were risks with that. Risks like being trapped in his old body for good if he were to be unable to separate himself. Risks, like loosing his memories and conforming to his old self. He had one shot there, one shot back, and if he missed his window…

She needed to hear it. It went against everything she stood for, but she needed it.

“Promise me,” Natasha asked, gripping Steve’s hand, “Swear to me that you’ll come back.”

“Nat…”

“Promise me Steve,” She was pleading with him, begging him to promise her that he would come back, even though they both knew the odds.

“I promise.”

Natasha’s mind eased and before she could stop herself, she leaned up, kissing him. He leaned in kissing her back, and she had to force herself to stop before she made him stay.

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

Natasha stood back as Steve activated his transmitter and disappeared into time. There were footsteps behind her, and she turned around to see her best friend.

“You two have the worst timing.”

“What if he doesn’t come back?” She asked, fear now over taking her.

“You’ll figure it out, you always do,” Clint reminded, hugging her. “We should go, the others are waiting.”

She nodded, taking one last look toward where Steve had stood before following Clint back to the others.

“Alright, now this is crucial okay?” Scott said, beginning to explain the process of getting back. “When we get sucked back in, your regulator has to be turned off or else you won’t be able to conform to your present body-which is technically the one we’re in. So, no time should have passed, and we should remember everything. I hope.”

“What exactly happens if we don’t remember?” Clint asked, and Scott frowned.

“Well uh, there’s a chance we’ll all slowly go insane which is why we didn’t conform to our bodies to begin with.”

“Lovely,” Clint frowned taking a deep breath, “Let’s get this over with.”

They all nodded, activating the transmitters and allowing themselves to be sucked through before turning off their regulators. She was never going to get over the sights and sounds of the quantum realms and she let herself really look as they traveled towards their destination.

“Nat…”

“Steve?” Natasha shook her head, she was hearing things.

“Nat.”

Natasha stopped and turned around looking for the voice. No, Scott warned them about this, about not stopping, to just ignore them and keep going, but it felt like it was getting closer…

“Natasha! No!”

She looked back at Clint’s cry and she realized the sound was getting closer because she’d been following it. It yanked at her suddenly and she found herself falling until there was nothing but darkness.

“Huh!” Natasha gasped sitting up right as she jolted awake and frantically looked around.

She was in her old bedroom in her apartment in D.C. She looked down to find she was no longer in her uniform, now in bed shorts and a tank top. She lifted her hands, touching the ends of her hair to find it was short again. Her phone buzzed on the side-table next to her and she jumped grabbing it.

“Hello?” She answered cautiously and heard a gruff sigh.

_“I’ve been put on leave.”_

_Clint._

“Leave?”

_“Yeah, Nick thinks I need time to let the events of the last few months sink in and told me to go home. Cause Laura won’t worry over me for the next eternity.”_

She frowned, _leave…_ Clint’s forced medical leave. Shit!

_“I know!”_

She sighed realizing she’d said that out loud.

_“I mean I know Laura wants me home, but God, I need to be in the field again. As is, everyone thinks I’m compromised, and this isn’t helping.”_

She’d gone to the wrong time…but she remembers. She remembers that she wasn’t supposed to be here. That was good, but what wasn’t was the fact she was in the wrong freaking time!

_“Nat you there?”_

“Crap, yeah, sorry! Look, take a few months. It’ll be fine.” Natasha reassured him and she knew it would.

_“How can you be so sure?”_ He asked, he sounded defeated and she knew this was killing him.

“I don’t know…I just do.”

He sighed, but she could tell it had done something to ease his worry.

_“Yeah, you’re right.”_

“Always am.”

_“Just do me a favor, don’t kill him,”_ She rolled her eyes.

“I promise I won’t strangle Nick.”

_“No, Captain Rogers, I’m not supposed to tell you, but Nick’s planning on partnering you up with him for the mean time.”_

_Steve…_

“Huh…”

_“Yeah, alright my flights about to board,”_

Natasha pulled herself from her thoughts,

“Okay, be safe.”

He hung up and she dropped her phone into her lap. That’s right, Clint had been the one to tell her Steve had taken up Nick’s offer to work for SHIELD. Natasha looked down at her phone knowing Nick’s number was going to pop-up any minute and realized her regulator and transmitter were gone. _No._ Of course she’d lost them, she wasn’t in _her_ body she was in her old body. Scott had also said that would probably happen as well-

_Steve._

Her heart sank. He was gone. _“No, Captain Rogers...”_ Clint, he’d said Steve was still going to be her partner, but what are the chances? What if this memory thing was only temporary? What if he’d already forgotten or never gotten there? Her phone began buzzing again and she picked it up.

“Nick-”

_“He told you, didn’t he?”_

“Of course, he did.” Natasha answered as she got up, dashing over to the closet as she dug out something to change into.

_“Well, then, I guess that was easy. Anyways, I know it’s not ideal, but you two worked well together in New York and he’s having some trouble…adjusting.”_

She remembers this clear as day and she huffed as she shoved herself into a pair of jeans.

“Yeah because partnering America’s golden boy with Russia’s most lethal assassin won’t be the brunt of office gossip.”

_“They’ll get over it. He’s taking the next few days to get settled, and in the mean time I want you to come up with a plan of assessment and spend the week assessing his skills and where his head is at…Romanoff?”_

She sighed getting her shirt over her head and picked her phone back up.

“Take time, make plan, evaluate, train. I got it.” _Come on Nick hang up the goddamn phone._

_“Alright then. Good-”_

“Bye.” She hung up the phone, knowing it was probably a little too short, but she didn’t care to over think it right now, not when Steve could be waiting for her.

She grabbed her keys and wallet, before heading out and found her Corvette right in its usual spot. She was anxious, her fingers drumming on the steering wheel as she made her way through D.C. traffic. It wasn’t even like they’d been separated that long. Two hours tops from him leaving her and her getting sucked into the wrong time vortex. But it felt like forever, and depending on how everything went, it could be forever.

She pulled up outside his apartment complex and saw his bike parked along the corner curb. She took a deep breath, getting out of the car and headed inside, climbing the three flights of stairs before she stopped. _3B_ there it was. There he was…before she lost her nerve she knocked and heard something fall and a muffled curse before the door opened and her breath caught in her throat. God, he looked young. His hair was the same as it had been back then, a little longer, combed to the side and those clothes. _Those God-awful clothes!_

“N-Agent Romanoff, this is surprise.” Steve answered, the shock evident on his face. _Wait did he almost say Nat? Shit I should say something. Say something!_

“Hi, uh, yeah, Fury called me. I don’t know if he’s talked to you yet, but he wants us to partner up for a bit.”

_Well that sounded weird._

He frowned cocking his head a little.

“I see…and you came all the way down here to tell me that?” He looked suspicious, this whole thing sounded suspicious.

“No…actually I thought you might like some help moving in.”

_Smooth Romanoff! Real smooth._

He looked hesitant. He had every right to be, this was not how things went last time. Last time she’d done exactly as Nick had asked her to and they really didn’t start “bonding” for a few more months.

“Sure, that’d uh, that’d be great. Maybe you could tell me what I’m supposed to do with half the stuff SHIELD left me with.”

She smiled, the tension easing as he stepped aside to let her in. She hadn’t been back here since before Nick had been shot. She had really liked this apartment, it was modern, but had an old warmth to it. She could just about remember where everything had been to.

“They really did weigh you down with stuff, didn’t they?” Natasha commented looking around at all the boxes. SHIELD had decided to buy everything for him, now that she thinks about it, it’s probably how everything got bugged as well. She was going to have to fix that.

“Yeah, last apartment they set me up in everything was practically out of the forties and I may have told them it wasn’t necessary. Now I’ve got all this stuff I have no use for.”

She laughed shaking her head.

“Be careful what you wish for.”

“I’ll make sure to keep that in mind,” he responded, and she looked back and noticed he wasn’t as tense as she remembers him being with her before.

“So…where do you want to start?”

“Uh, how about the kitchen?” he said with a slight laugh and she smiled following his lead.

* * *

Over the next few hours they had managed to sort and find a home for almost everything. He still had a lot of books. More books than she was sure one man needed but knew he would read over the coming years as he got acquainted. She was pulling out a few picture frames trying to remember where he had hung them before when there was a knock on the door. Steve had said he wanted to order something from a place a neighbor had recommended, and she told him to order her anything. Chinese. She could smell it from the living room and a small smile came to her as she set the frames down before joining him in the kitchen.

“That smells amazing!” She commented saddling up beside him to see what he’d ordered.

“I wasn’t sure what you’d like so I just got a little bit of everything.”

As he pulled out the containers, she found all their favorites. It was their usual order, no matter what Chinese restaurant, no matter where, they always got the same thing…

“These are my favorites, you a mind reader now Rogers?” She teased trying to gage his reaction.

“Uh no, I kind of just picked out what sounded good,” Steve responded with a slight twitch, barely noticeable, but it was there.

_It was a lie…he was lying._

“Thanos.”

He froze, his head turning to look at her, his eyes securitizing her.

“What?”

“Thanos,” she repeated this time with more conviction, her eyes boring into his.

She watched as his face fell, fear and shock taking over as he set down the container he had in hand.

“Nat?”

She took a shuddering breath, nodding as he reached out grabbing her, hugging her tight as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders burying her face into his neck. _He remembers_.

“Oh God, Nat, how are you here?” he asked, his voice cracking as he tried keeping it together.

“I took a wrong turn,” she laughed, blinking the tears from her eyes.

“How do you take a wrong turn? It’s a vortex,” he asked, his tone light and teasing.

“I heard you calling me and before I could stop myself, I was following it…I was following you,” she leaned back and cupped his face, brushing away the stray tears from his cheeks.

“God…I thought I’d have to wait another decade for you.”

She shook her head pulling him down for a kiss and she felt like melting into him.

“Please tell me you found the bugs, because I only found five?” She asked, a little breathless as she realized she hadn’t collected all of them.

“Oh, thank God, I was worried that I could only find half. I thought maybe they went in later.”

She laughed shaking her head.

“No, but when they don’t activate, they’ll probably get replaced. I killed the battery in mine, you?”

“Yeah, but I left them in their spot.”

She smiled, “I taught you so well.”

She kissed him again, but this time pulled him along as she started walking back.

“Where are we going?” Steve asked in between kisses.

“The bedroom,” she replied taking his hand. He looked back at their dinner and frowned.

“But dinner-”

“Nine years, three world ending events, one we fought in _twice_ against _aliens_ and a demi-god, we watched our friends die, we lost our lives, traveled through time to fix it, and nearly lost each other in the process…dinner can wait,” Natasha responded, not wanting to waste another second.

Steve raised an eyebrow trying to hide his smirk.

“Bossy much?”

“You have no idea,” she teased, her lips just grazing his.

“I think I might, actually.”

She smirked, licking her lips as she stepped out of his reach, adding a sway to her hips. She stopped at the entrance to the hallway and looked over her shoulder noticing he was still in the kitchen.

“Well come on soldier boy,”

He rolled his eyes, the smile falling into an annoyed frown and she laughed.

“Nat you know I’m going to have that damn song stuck in my head now.”

She grinned, leaning against the hall entrance.

“Well if you hurry up, I’ll make sure you have something else much more pleasurable stuck in your head.”

She pushed off the wall, grabbing the ends of her shirt and pulling it up and over her head. She tossed it in his direction before continuing down the hall, unable to keep the smile from her face as he caught up to her.

* * *

Natasha sighed, biting her lip as she turned her head to look at the man next to her as they both tried to catch their breath.

“Glad you waited on dinner?” Natasha asked and he sighed shaking his head.

“Yes, but I’m thinking I should have ordered more food.”

“Oh God you’re one of those people,” Natasha chided teasingly as Steve got up going to the bathroom.

“What?”

“One of those people who has to eat after sex,” she explained as he came out and put a pair of sweats on.

“Well, my body basically lives to eat so…” Steve concluded with a shrug.

“You’re putting pants on to go to the kitchen?”

“I have neighbors, remember? The chick across the street you once tried to set me up with who would always wave at me through her window?”

Natasha’s eyes went wide as she covered her laugh with her hand.

“Oh my god! I forgot about her!”

“Yeah!” Steve said, like he couldn’t believe she had.

“Well, can’t really blame her, it is a nice view.” His cheeks tinted pink and he shook his head.

“I’m going to go heat up dinner, I take it you have no intentions of moving?”

She fell back against the pillows with a sigh and an exaggerated shake of her head.

“Alright then, give me a few,” he tapped the doorframe on the way out like he always did when he was excited.

She stretched, sighing as she felt the tired ache setting into her muscles. She should really clean up a little before she lost the rest of her oomph. She got up from the bed going into the bathroom to freshen up a bit before rummaging through Steve’s closet to find his Army t-shirt. She slipped it on over her head before remaking the bed.

Just as she finished Steve came back into the room with a tray of food and some beers. He smiled, shaking his head at her when he saw what she was wearing.

“Should have known you’d go right for the t-shirts,” he remarked setting everything down as she sat back down on the bed.

“Considering it’s been in my closet for three years now, I think I have some ownership rights.”

“That so?”

“Yup!”

He laughed, opening two beers and handing her one as she started to dig into the food with a satisfied hum. They sat in silence while they ate, but Natasha knew the atmosphere had changed. Everything from the last few years finally started to sink in now that the adrenaline was gone.

“What happened Steve?” Natasha finally asked after a long pause and he sighed, the same weight she’d seen him carry for so long returning.

“As you already probably figured out, when I merged with my old self, my transmitter and regulator disappeared. I was able to stop Schmidt from being sucked up into the Tesseract, but I was stuck. So…I went back under, and when I woke up, I was in the same fake hospital room inside SHIELD with the same fake SSR agent and the same guards trying to keep me from freaking out. I’ve basically been going through the motions hoping that if I did, I’d eventually catch up to you and everyone else.”

Her heart hurt to hear him say that. He’d now spent twice as long in the ice than he should have, and he had been stuck unable to do anything but watch time pass by again. This time, however, knowing how things could play out.

“So, Scott’s theory about our memories was wrong?” She asked next and he shrugged.

“Yes and no. I was worried I’d start to forget when I went under, but when I came back, I was surprised to have remembered them so I started writing everything down that I could. It’s basically all I’ve been doing. I think since everything that I remembered was still a what if scenario and had yet to happen I still was able to remember. Nothing about my past has changed, but small things here and there I’ve noticed seem odd like they aren’t right. I mainly tried to focus on writing down the big things.”

It made sense that his memories from before the war hadn’t changed and the ones now were only changing marginally. The real question was how would hers fair? How would the others fair as well?

“So, my past?” She asked hesitantly and he shrugged.

“I have no clue if what I did changed anything other than how Schmidt died. Since we took out Thanos using the suites when the void was open, our selves on Earth didn’t seem to notice. However, since the stones still exist, there’s no telling whether they’ll become a problem ever again. If there’s one thing I’ve learned it’s that there will always be evil in the universe.”

He had a fair point. They really had no way of knowing if what they did will really make a difference. Thanos had so many followers, but he also had far more enemies.

“So, what happens now?”

He shrugged.

“Dunno. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. Only downside is we’re going to have to relive the next seven years and try not to change anything else.”

She raised her eyebrow.

“I think it’s a little late for that. Last time I checked we never had sex in those years, let alone the first day you moved to D.C.”

“Okay besides that!” Steve corrected, and she smiled a little as the weight ebbed some and he went back to his food.

“So, Laura and the kids…?”

“Accounted for. Clint’s on his way home now, obviously though Nate’s a question mark for the time being.”

She figured he’d be coming along soon, but she also knew she had to be careful.

“Good, out of everyone, Clint was the one I was worried about the most.”

Natasha frowned.

“Not even me?”

He shook his head, looking a little guilty.

“When we had gone to the farm and had found them…yeah, I was afraid of what would happen to you, but Clint…you both are strong in your own rights, but its different. For him his family was the only thing keeping him together. You, you made yourself. Sure, he helped, but I knew you’d survive without them, because you’d do it for them. You’re stubborn in that way. It would change you, haunt you, and you wouldn’t be the same, but not like Clint.”

“You’re wrong about one thing,” Natasha said, taking his hand.

“And what’s that?”

“I wouldn’t have survived without you,” she wouldn’t have. He was her Laura, he’d brought something into her life, made it better, made her feel like it wasn’t just about clearing her ledger. Made her feel free.

“You would have, I knew you would, I wouldn’t have left otherwise.”

“Leaving to stop a fight is one thing but loosing you like that? Watching you disintegrate in front of me like that? That’s not something I could come back from.”

It wasn’t. Sure, they chose to fight against Thanos. They knew they’d likely die, they’d agreed on it, but dying because some random unseen force played eeny, meeny, miny, moe with the universe at Thanos’ will wasn’t something she could handle. She’d barely handled it to begin with.

“Well, now we never have to find out,” Steve finalized, moving so he could tuck her into his chest.

“Unless someone else decides to plan mass genocide.”

“You know I hate to say it, but I get where he was coming from,” Steve said, Natasha sat up and frowned.

“He killed billions of people.”

“Yeah, he did and that’s not okay, but his reasoning behind it was disturbingly understandable. I grew up with limited resources in an overcrowded neighborhood that was crumbling. I would have given anything, to see it thrive. He had the stones. He could have just added more resources or expanded the universe, but instead he decided the universe didn’t deserve those things, or just didn’t see the other uses of the stones it’s hard to tell with him.” Steve explained and she could see then the struggle inside his mind. Thanos had gotten into their heads unlike anyone they had faced, and it had picked them apart.

“He was sick, Steve, it didn’t matter what other uses the stones possess, part of him wanted revenge and it took over everything. That’s what makes you different.” Natasha reminded him, trying to get his head back on track.

“I know, it’s just hard to think about.”

“So, don’t. It’s over, he’s gone, and you know the truth. Those stones were never meant to be understood, they were never meant to be used like that. Life isn’t about perfection, it’s about living, no matter how bad things get. You do what you can to make it good, and hope others do the same.”

Life would go on regardless of what happened. People-beings-were selfish, they were imperfect and had faults. They destroy and take, but you have the choice to make it better the best you can. In the end what’s important is that you did what you could, and if others don’t do the same well that’s their problem, not yours. You move on, and you live.

“I’m sorry,” Steve kissed the top of her head and she sighed.

“Nothing to be sorry about, it’s natural to try and rationalize the things you can’t understand. Trust me, I’ve spent the better part of this hell trying to figure it out.” More times then she would like.

But it was over now, and if they were to move on then they had to put it behind.

“So, I guess I need to get myself a notebook.” She said, changing the subject.

“I would, but like I said, I don’t think we’ll have too much trouble,” Steve assured, her. “So, uh, should we talk about…this?” Steve asked motioning between them.

_Right…_

“Do you want to talk about it?” She asked, hoping for the best and he cringed.

“I don’t know, but I feel like if we don’t, we’ll end up ignoring it and things will go back to how they were.”

She sighed setting down her container of food as she turned to him.

“Steve, I have no intentions of pretending this didn’t happen. Not now, not ever. I wouldn’t have done it otherwise. We spent eight years of our lives together, working together, and I spent so much time making excuses as to why I couldn’t have you. I’m not doing that again. We have the chance to do it our way this time. We know the fears we faced, the trials we’ll face, looking back I knew you needed time to figure things out, and I’d hoped you would have, but then fear and doubt came over me and then we just didn’t have time for it. I thought I had to be an Avenger and nothing else, it wasn’t a choice not anymore, but it was all just excuses. I want this Steve, I’ve wanted it for a long time. This is our second chance at life-or third or would it be fourth?”

“Three and half.” He rationed and she grinned.

“Three and half.”

He smiled, the weight lifting as he leaned in to kiss her, once again melting away her fears.

They were stuck here. They would have to relive events neither one would care to, but they had each other and so long as they were together nothing could break them.


End file.
